How AMCHAM Uganda VP Meg Hilbert Jaquay an American Woman’s Operations Left Toro Kingdom on its knees to Tactfully  Grabbing  94 year Old Widow Edith Jakana’s Livelihood

When one meets the American Chamber of Commerce Uganda Chapter Vice President Meg Hilbert Jaquay, they would be immediately swept away by her homily approach and delicate smile.

Meg, boasts of over 30 years of business leadership experience across the globe at the helm of management of several companies, though efforts to tick out at least five to match her claim still remain elusive.  

Meg, who prides herself as a confessed jack of all trades with a penchant for food is no stranger to the bounty of foods that Uganda the pearl of Africa produces all year round.

Though she claims to have arrived in Uganda about five years ago and pitched camp in Kawempe …….. our investigations have indicated otherwise.

A source who preferred anonymity informed us that Meg has been traversing the country since the early 90’s and is richly knowledgeable of its geography.  

The source alleges that Meg, initially at the time was a frequent long haul guest of the Toro Kingdom and at the time was a close associate of both the Queen mother Besti Kemigisha, and Kingdom premier (Muhikirwa)

Strategic Alliances and Business Ventures

After she fell out with the Toro Kindom, Meg, went back to the United States of America briefly and later returned as a BnB Guest of Daniel Jakana Jr at the Jakana Estate in Kawempe.

Meg, at the time, had arrived with a couple of other Americans, who it was later learned had come clandestinely as business associates of Daniel Jakana.

During this period, Meg, her colleagues, and the managing director Daniel Jakana, managed to formulate a semblance of adding value to the already existing fruit-making business into the ‘drying’ fruit line business.

To provide initiation and acclimatization into the pros and cons of the business Daniel delegated his trusted and intimate friend Aisha to locally orientate them.

In a fickle of time, she assumed the role of ‘process engineer’ of the now contested Jakana Foods LTD and later became its Managing Director.

Strategic Career Moves

With the backing of this portfolio Meg, was now in a position to officially join AmCham Uganda a Company limited by guarantee that was founded in December 2008 by American investors in Uganda with an interest in fostering and promoting greater commercial and cultural ties, cooperation, and dialogue between Ugandan and American firms and related professionals.

Indeed later was appointed the Vice President of the Ugandan Chapter a position she still holds to date.

However, it also emerged in another interview that Meg had now assumed the Jakana family name a development that shocked many a family member and elders.

The same Jakana Foods LTD is also alleged to be her pivotal chip in trying to access funding from the now botched AGOA ……… funding.  

THE SAD EDITH JAKANA STORY RECAP  ;

Whereas having been started in the kitchen of Edith Nagujja Jakana, now 94, as an in-house remedy to quench the thirst of her then-ailing family Patriarch   Daniel Nelson Jakana, the future Jakana Fruits LTD would be eventually born.

The abundance of readily available variety of fruits would interest Nagujja, to concoct both punch and cocktails for both her immediate family and guests that came to visit the bedridden head of the home.

This initiative would later impress her son Daniel Jakana Junior, who had also come to visit his sick father from the United States where he had been studying at the time, to interest in creating a Jakana Fruits ‘project’ and coerced her (His mother Edith Nagujja) into his prospect of adding value to her juice.

This she would achieve by procuring machinery that Daniel, had told her was available in the US, and thus she agreed to a plan to sell off their cattle in a bid to kick start the venture.

Indeed, a while later, Jakana Fruits Ltd, was born and Daniel himself would engage in the selling and marketing of his mother’s products in and around Kampala.

The Genesis

As Nagujja was becoming continuously busy with her husband’s illness, Daniel, tactfully graduated into keeping the juice flow both in the ‘industry’ and on the market.

Unfortunately, Jakana Snr would breathe his last on 24th December 1994, ushering in a void for Nagujja and the children.

It is during this mourning period that the Jakana Fruits Ltd was founded with Daniel assuring his mother that the new company belonged to her and the other family members at the time.

With the business market gaining momentum, Daniel requested his mother that he set up a temporary structure to press the juice, but instead set up permanent structures on the land.

It was during this time that Daniel told his mother of the need to formalize their tenancy on the 2-acre piece of land with the Buganda Land Board.

In this already complex and confusing situation, Daniel would periodically bring a mammoth of documents which he would advise the mother to sign off on the basis of him having read through them.

Betrayal and Legal Battles

Only to be taken aback and shocked, Edith learned later that instead of executing the procedure as earlier agreed upon, Daniel had instead demarcated the land leaving her with only 18 Decimals that harbor the house the old and ailing lady currently lives in.

Thinking that it was a fool’s day joke, Nagujja, engaged the services of their family lawyer at the time who confirmed that indeed such a process had taken effect and advised her to place a caveat on the land.

She would later be taken aback to hear that 0.066 Hectares had been sold to Kampala City Council Authority at 827 453 640 (Eight Hundred Twenty-Seven Million, Four Hundred Fifty-Three Thousand six hundred and forty), by Daniel and his now Jakana Foods LTD, in spite of an existing caveat on the estate, a matter that is currently being contested by Nagujja, at the High Court of Uganda (Land Division).